A life told through scraps of paper, in just 14 minutes. The new film by don hertzfeldt — the American filmmaker nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film with World of Tomorrow (2016), which also screened at IndieLisboa — is a frenetic exercise, darting between the concrete and the abstract, between colored pencil and blue ballpoint pen, and bursting with inventive energy.
What does the trail we leave on paper over the course of a lifetime say about us? In a vertiginous flow of marks, words and drawings, Paper Trail reconstructs an entire life through fragments of paper alone – from childhood scribbles to school exercises, notes, forms and signatures – tracing the evolution of handwriting and identity. Using animation techniques developed for the film, don hertzfeldt turns the act of drawing and writing into pure movement, condensing time into a hypnotic and deeply affecting audiovisual experience. (Cláudia Marques)
